REVENUE T

TEAMS THE +

THE GO-TO-
GO-TO-MAR
MARKET PL
PLAYBOOK
FOR REVENU
REVENUE TH
TEAMS THE
THE GO-TO-
How to Align & Action Marketing, Sales, and

GO-TO-MAR
Customer Success to Accelerate Revenue
 +

TABLE OF
CONTENTS
4 Introduction: Why B2B Businesses Need to Rethink Revenue Growth

6 Revenue Acceleration: How to Move From Alignment to Action

6 Organizational Friction & Why It’s Hurting Your Bottom Line
7 What is Revenue Operations & Revenue Acceleration?
11 Accelerating Revenue with a Revenue Process Playbook

14 Engage: How Modern Marketers Generate Awareness & Drive Meetings

14 Defining Marketing Metrics & KPIs
17 Understanding Your Target Audience
19 Nailing Engagement & Targeting: Right Time, Right Message, Right Place
20 The Role of the SDR in Accelerating Opportunities

24 Execute: How High-Performance Sales Teams Accelerate Pipeline to Close

24 Defining Sales Metrics & KPIs
27 Embracing Sales Enablement & Coaching
32 Leveling Up Targeting & Outreaching

36 Expand: How Best-in-Class Customer Success Retains & Grows Accounts

36 Defining Customer Success Metrics & KPIs
39 Embracing CSM Enablement & Coaching
40 Growing Customer Value & Retention

45 Final Thoughts: Revenue is a Process

46 About Drift
46 About Clari

2
 +

Clari, like Drift, has been

singing the same tune
that revenue is a process.
For that reason, to truly
impact long-term revenue
growth, you need not
just the solutions, but the
processes in place, to
make it happen.

3
 +

INTRODUCTION

WHY B2B
BUSINESSES
NEED TO RETHINK
REVENUE GROWTH
BY TODD BARNETT
Chief Revenue Officer, Drift

Sales has always had a seat at the c-suite table. After all, for CEOs, sales and
revenue are top of mind in driving any strategic decision.
But the mindset that revenue growth begins and ends with sales has become
outdated. This is due to three key shifts:

• A B2B buyer’s journey that is more sophisticated, nuanced, non-linear,

and unpredictable

• The rise of SaaS and new subscription-based revenue models requiring

companies to re-win business and double down on metrics like recurring
revenue, churn, up-sell, and net dollar retention

• And rapid innovation that has pushed companies to change growth initiatives
and strategies faster than ever before

For these reasons, sales’ responsibility around revenue needs to be shared across
all revenue-generating teams: marketing, sales, and customer success. These
shifts have required businesses to look beyond traditional and siloed revenue
teams – and to the creation of roles like my own: the Chief Revenue Officer (CRO).
The CRO earned a seat at the c-suite table because revenue growth needs
oversight. It needs constant maintenance and tweaking. And it needs someone at
the helm removing silos and identifying the strategic levers to pull that will grow
a company’s revenue.
Alongside my emerging role has been the rise of revenue operations.

4
 +

For years businesses have been talking about digital transformation and the need
to streamline the customer experience – but not the internal changes that need
to happen in parallel. As companies get smarter about their growth, they must
introduce new processes to align and action their go-to-market (GTM) teams.
That’s the beauty of revenue operations and Revenue Acceleration:
Revenue operations aligns the entire revenue team, streamlines operational
cadences, and enables consistent execution. Revenue Acceleration helps action
these teams in their day-to-day work.
Clari, like Drift, has been singing the same tune that revenue is a process. For
that reason, to truly impact long-term revenue growth, you need not just the
solutions, but the processes in place, to make it happen.
In this guide, we’re sharing our playbook for aligning and actioning revenue teams
through revenue operations and Revenue Acceleration. Plus, you’ll learn from the
leaders at these two companies on how you can drive revenue growth internally.
We’re in unprecedented times – 2020 has forced us to throw out well-laid
plans and required companies to address flaws in their GTM and customer
experience at lightning speed. Analysts now say that 10 years of digital
transformation is happening in one. In addition, companies looking to remove
silos across their teams are dealing with a more distributed workforce – and
customer base.
If there was ever a moment for your company – and revenue teams – to come
together, it’s now.

5
 +

REVENUE ACCELERATION

HOW TO MOVE
FROM ALIGNMENT
TO ACTION
No person is an island. That’s especially true when it comes to
growing your business. In this chapter, you’ll learn how companies
can break down organizational silos to create more accountability
across revenue-generating teams. We’ll also introduce a playbook to
set your teams up for success and accelerate GTM motions.

Organizational Friction & Why It’s Hurting Your

Bottom Line
Silos have always been a point of contention in B2B businesses.
Whole organizations were (and continue to be) run by departments ruled by
different missions and revenue goals. And nowhere are these headaches felt more
deeply than in marketing, sales, and CS.

“A good relationship between marketing, sales, and customer success looks like
a tried and true partnership. These teams need to stop pointing fingers and take
ownership around the revenue process and their role in driving that process.
They need to identify strategic gaps and help one another bridge those gaps.”

KATE ADAMS
VP of Demand Generation, Drift

Customer journeys have become increasingly complex. A growing number of

touchpoints and channels have made it harder – yet more important than ever
– for companies to remain agile. But a lack of alignment across GTM teams is
hurting outcomes.

6
 +

Marketing, sales, and CS are now called on to work in lockstep in order to

streamline experiences for customers and build a sustainable business of the
future. One that is focused on digital and customer experiences.
Yet, many of these teams struggle to align and work alongside one another. And
this internal friction is spilling out into their customer experience.
For that reason, two functions have become increasingly important to help
companies remove friction: revenue operations and Revenue Acceleration.

What is Revenue Operations &

Revenue Acceleration?
Revenue operations is the end-to end-process of generating revenue. Revenue is
not just an outcome, it's a process that can be optimized and streamlined.

“Teams and processes are more interconnected than ever. Companies that adopt
the revenue operations mindset will be the ones that find ways to evolve and
optimize their end-to-end revenue process. This agility, evolution, and team
cohesion is a competitive advantage.”

KYLE COLEMAN
VP of Revenue Growth & Enablement, Clari

The purpose of revenue operations is to better align the entire revenue team with
a consistent, real-time view of their business to inform action and optimize the
revenue process. Revenue operations helps unify:
• People: Aligning marketing, sales, and CS

• Data: Connecting business and activity data across organizational silos and
technology stacks

• Processes: Streamlining operational cadences and enablement across each

team to drive consistency and repeatable wins

Revenue Acceleration is part of the revenue operations process.

Where revenue operations focuses on execution and aligning teams, Revenue
Acceleration actions them. Revenue Acceleration provides the tactics and tools for
marketing, sales, and CS to take action in their day-to-day work.

7
 +

Both Revenue Acceleration and revenue operations have the same goal in mind: To
introduce full-funnel accountability between the three revenue teams and focus on
providing more value to customers.

“Instead of seeing marketing, sales, and customer success as three separate

entities with unique goals (demand, new business, customer health, and
retention), with Revenue Acceleration, they’re a unified team. This revenue
team helps customers achieve the value they expect from your brand.”

JULIE HOGAN
VP of Customer Experience, Drift

According to a study by SiriusDecisions, companies that align their revenue

teams experience 15% higher profitability and 19% faster revenue growth.
Companies that use revenue operations to accelerate revenue are able to do so
because they are on the same page, act on the same insights, and are motivated by
the same goals. In other words, they have full-funnel accountability.
One of the best ways to get these teams on the same page? Rallying them around
the customer. After all, 84% of B2B sales start with a referral – meaning a good
customer experience is worth its weight in gold.

8
 +

Customer lifetime value (CLV) is a key metric used to tie marketing, sales, and CS
to both the customer and revenue. These teams each own a revenue segment that
impacts the experience and success of CLV.

NEW BUSINESS

UPSELL RETENTION

But revenue teams also need to have a “common view” or “shared truth” of their
customer lifecycle and pipeline – and understand how they impact the metrics
that matter.
Once teams have a single source of truth around data, instead of debating who's
got the right number or why the data doesn't match up, you can proactively take
actions that allow you to:
• Identify deal risk and upsides

• Accelerate current quarter pipeline

• And accurately predict revenue early in the quarter as well as forecast

future quarters

Once you have a single source of truth (your pipeline and forecast) and are able
to prescribe next steps, your company can start looking two, three, even four
quarters out.
To help create more predictability in your revenue process across marketing,
sales, and CS, next we’ll share our framework and model for revenue operations
and Revenue Acceleration.

9
 +

Once you have a single

source of truth (your
pipeline and forecast) and
are able to prescribe next
steps, your company can
start looking two, three,
even four quarters out.

10
 +

Accelerating Revenue with a Revenue

Process Playbook
Unless you have the right framework in place to guide and prescribe next steps for
revenue teams, you’re still introducing elements of unpredictability into your pipeline.
So Clari and Drift are sharing their frameworks for aligning and actioning
revenue teams around the customer.

MARKETING SALES CS
ALIGNMENT

Engage Execute Expand

Operating Plan Revenue

1 2 3 4 5
ACTIONS

Engage Target Accelerate Grow Transform

Website Potential Deal Cycles Customer Customer
Visitors Buyers Value Engagement
OUTCOMES

New Customer Customer

Meetings Pipeline Bookings Adoption Retention

As shown in the image, this framework is broken down into three parts. The first
is alignment.
Here we see the Clari Revenue Operations Framework.
This framework begins by defining your company's operating plan. An operating plan
is where your revenue goals are set by company leaders and should be visible to the rest
of the organization. Operations works with finance to create a master document that
serves as the basis for all marketing, sales, and CS goals for the whole year.
From there, you have three main phases:
• Engage: In this phase, revenue teams – especially in the marketing
function – need to make sure they're targeting the right accounts with the
right campaigns. The sales development (SDR) team should also be actively
prospecting into accounts with the right messaging for the right personas.
The teams at this stage are focused on the top-of-funnel pipeline plan.

11
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• Execute: Here, you enable your sales team through coaching and guidance to
convert that pipeline to close. This stage includes all the rep/manager one-on-
ones, pipeline reviews and forecast calls throughout the quarter (to evaluate
current quarter execution against targets), and pipeline build for future quarters.

• Expand: The expand phase is where you retain customers and grow your
footprint within those accounts. Specifically, CS is focused on product usage,
customer retention, and finding white space for expansion within accounts. CS
delivers the current and next quarter churn forecast against net retention targets.

“Invest in tools, technologies, and processes that ensure you’re reaching the right
people at the right accounts at the right time.”

KYLE COLEMAN
VP of Revenue Growth & Enablement, Clari

Next, we move into actions. This is where Drift’s Revenue Acceleration Model
comes into play. These are the high-level process steps used to move buyers and
customers through the funnel:
• Engage with buyers/website visitors

• Target potential buyers

• Accelerate deal cycles

• Grow customer value

• Transform customer engagement

Depending on the structure of your teams, these actions may overlap between
marketing, sales, and CS. For example, if account managers and responsibilities
around expansion live under the sales function versus CS, then “Grow customer
value,” toes the line between sales and CS.

12
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“Historically, there has been a lot of feuding between marketing, sales, and
customer success about who is contributing to revenue and responsible for
driving the numbers. With revenue operations and acceleration, you can bring
together the measurement and metrics to ensure a single flow of processes,
technologies, and data.”

TRICIA GELLMAN
Chief Marketing Officer, Drift

Finally, we land on outcomes. Outcomes are the endpoint objectives your teams are
trying to achieve at each stage. These outcomes should focus on moving buyers
and customers through the funnel effectively.
In the next few chapters we’ll walk through these unique processes in detail,
as well as:
• The responsibility of marketing, sales, and CS in accelerating revenue and
growing CLV

• What metrics revenue teams should measure their performance against

• How companies can use data to action revenue teams

• Best practices for targeting and engaging buyers in an increasingly digital world

• And how SDRs and enablement should be rolled out to streamline GTM motions

Learn more about this framework from the Drift and Clari
teams here: Why a Revenue Team is Your Key to Unlocking
Your Full Revenue Potential

13
 +

ENGAGE

HOW MODERN
MARKETERS
GENERATE
AWARENESS &
DRIVE MEETINGS
The rise of ABM has resulted in marketing campaigns that are more
targeted, personalized, and relevant to buyers. Yet, many marketers still
struggle to track the ROI of their efforts. In this chapter, we’re sharing
how to build and measure a marketing machine that creates better buyer
experiences, drives meetings, and increases pipeline.

Defining Marketing Metrics & KPIs

Marketing teams ruled entirely by lead generation often suffer from three pitfalls:

Lead quality issues

Volume is important, but so is lead quality. Many B2B businesses are now using
account-based marketing (ABM) to better target ICP accounts and craft more
effective campaigns.

Poor pipeline forecasting

If you have poor lead quality, your pipeline forecasting will most certainly suffer.
Given that forecasting improves accountability, this is a huge hurdle to overcome
in order to achieve cross-team alignment.

An inability to effectively prove ROI

Leads alone don’t move the needle. Marketing needs to show its impact on the
business. By focusing on engagement and meetings, it’s easier to understand
tangible ROI.

14
 +

So what specific metrics and KPIs should your marketers focus on?
While some metrics depend on whether or not SDRs sit in marketing (more
on that later), here are the high-level metrics we recommend to keep marketing
accountable:
• Quarter-to-date pipeline created: This is volume. As mentioned, volume
does still matter and it trickles down to impact how other teams perform.

• Quarter-to-date pipeline quality: High intent or ABM accounts typically fall

under here.

• Pipeline acceleration/sales velocity: Speed matters at every point in your

funnel. How can you improve coverage and visibility on high-intent channels?
How can you streamline self-service so potential customers can move through
the funnel faster? How can you make it easier for sales to connect with buyers?

• Target account engagement: Different KPIs will feed into this – from
meetings booked to events attended to conversations had.

• Future pipeline coverage: This is the sum of your current sales opportunities
compared to the revenue targets in your operating plan.

“Marketing teams have focused too much on lead generating acronyms to

measure success. At Drift, our whole mantra is ‘get closer to the customer.’
That means we need to measure our success by how effectively we do that. We
believe this more human approach will rule marketing and sales of the future.”

KATE ADAMS
VP of Demand Generation, Drift

15
 +

Here are some example KPIs that would feed back into your high-level metrics:
• Decrease lead follow up time by 50% by EOQ

• Increase meetings booked rate by 25% by EOQ

• Increase conversations on product pages by 40% by EOY

• Increase conversions from paid ads by 20% by EOY

Your top-level KPIs should focus on improving the metrics above and:
• Engaging with buyers/website visitors

• Targeting potential buyers

Using this approach marketers can work backward to identify how their
contribution impacts quarterly goals.

“The key success metric at the top-of-the-funnel is qualified pipeline – the dollar
amount of the opportunities that sellers have validated and accepted into their
pipeline. This is the right balance between what marketing can control and what
sales actually cares about. Sorry MQLs, sales doesn’t care about you.”

KYLE COLEMAN
VP of Revenue Growth & Enablement, Clari

16
 +

Understanding Your Target Audience

Having a firm grasp on your ideal customer profile (ICP) is key to everything from
the campaigns you run to the messaging you use to the channels you invest in.
Most likely you’ve already defined your ICP with sales and shared this with the
rest of your company. But understanding pain points, personas, and company
profiles is just the tip of the iceberg.

“A more robust and detailed understanding of what has happened, coupled

with actionable insights about what’s going to happen, offers a deeper
understanding of your pipeline and its potential.”

KYLE COLEMAN
VP of Revenue Growth & Enablement, Clari

You need to know your target audience at a detailed level if you want more
engaging and high-converting conversations with buyers. This is a fundamental
step of Conversational Marketing.
The goal of Conversational Marketing is to start a conversation with buyers. To
add value to that conversation, you need to understand who your target audience
is and how they found you.

STAGE 1

Engage Website Visitors

WHO
Who are you engaging?
UNKNOWN KNOWN RETURNING

WHERE
Where are you engaging
WEBSITE
them from?

WHAT
What page are you PRICING PRODUCT SOLUTION RESOURCE
CENTER
BLOG CONTACT
US
engaging them on?

BUYER OUTCOMES BUSINESS OUTCOMES

WHY
Why are you Get Help Talk to Sales Learn More New Lead Meeting Sales Activity
Booked
engaging them?

17
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Identifying the touchpoints in a buyer’s journey is also necessary for delivering

a catered and personalized experience. This is the “where and what” of the
customer journey.

“People need efficiency. They need a convenient and cost-effective way

to drive business in a completely digital world. Doubling down on digital
transformation that enables real-time conversations is the new normal. Buyers
and customers won’t accept anything less.”

KATE ADAMS
VP of Demand Generation, Drift

The “why” is when we begin to engage with buyers. Most often these interactions
can be split between buyer outcomes (research, help) and business outcomes
(they’re ready to conduct business with your company). The why will be a
key turning point in navigating buyers/customers through your funnel and
accelerating revenue.

Chatbot
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Learn more about the four
Chatbot W’s and how to use them:
Looking to accelerate your digital
transformation at your company? You’ve
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come to the right place! Marketing Blueprint

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18
 +

Nailing Engagement & Targeting: Right Time,

Right Message, Right Place
81% of buyers conduct their own research before purchasing a product or
reaching out to a company. A majority of those buyers expect companies to tailor
digital experiences based on their past interactions.

“Today, people are juggling personal and professional time. They no longer have
the patience or time to wait around to engage with you and your brand. You
need to engage with buyers when they have the time and intent to engage with
you or you risk not engaging them at all and missing an opportunity to build
your brand and sell your solutions.”

TRICIA GELLMAN
Chief Marketing Officer, Drift

If you’ve done your research, you should have a good understanding of who your
buyer is, where they’ve been, and what they’ve shown interest in. Your outreach
should be catered and targeted around this information. You can measure successful
engagement by three things:

Timeliness
According to Salesforce, 71% of buyers expect companies to interact with them in
real-time. This explains the boom in AI-powered chatbots over the last few years as
businesses scale to a 24/7 world. Drift’s State of Conversational Marketing research
found that chatbot usage has grown by 92% since 2019. To accelerate revenue and deal
cycles, revenue teams must invest in channels that easily connect them with buyers.

Relevancy
Based on what you know about your buyers, how helpful is your marketing
message? How easy is it for them to get what they want during an interaction?

Targeting
The level of personalization and the type of outreach you use should be dictated
by segmentation. By segmenting your buyers into volume, target accounts, and top
target accounts you can better prioritize your channels, budget for campaigns, and
focus your energies for top target accounts.

19
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“Relationships with today’s B2B buyers are much more direct. Buyers are
crystal clear on their priorities. They have a clear set of criteria in order to
justify any purchase. The seller’s role is to find out how their solution can
solve the buyers’ problem despite these constraints.”

ANTHONY CESSARIO
VP of Enterprise Revenue, Clari

The Role of the SDR in Accelerating Opportunities

It’s nearly impossible to talk about engagement without acknowledging the vital
role of the SDR. SDRs work with marketing to follow-up and provide feedback on
campaigns, align with sales on buyer research, book meetings, and so much more.
While marketing has the systems (MAPs) in place to filter leads and accounts
to the right reps, SDRs are essential in accelerating deals and sharing anecdotal
information back to the company.

20
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Here we’re sharing an illustration from Clari’s Director of Growth, Natasha

Dolginsky, and Head of Revenue Development, Alex Jagiello, on how SDRs should
work alongside marketing and sales.

BEFORE

Plan Campaign
MARKETING SDR Lead Follow-up
Hand Over Leads

PIPE CONTRIBUTION Pre-sales Meeting Creation

AFTER

OPERATIONAL
PROCESS
SYSTEM

Lead Routing
Lead Scoring Attribution Reporting
and Alerting

Align on Roles and Responsibilities: Align on Pipeline KPIs and Ongoing Feedback Loop on
Marketing, SDRs, AND Sales Reporting to Measure Those Results Campaigns / Programs / Process

Plan Campaign Lead Follow-up

With Customization
by Account /
HUMAN PROCESS

Communicate Plan Persona Value

MARKETING SDR AND/
OR SALES
Provide Templates Use Intent Data to
Determine HOW,
Hand Over Leads WHOM, and WHEN
to Follow-up

PIPE CONTRIBUTION Pre-sales

Meeting Creation

Deal Acceleration

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The before state shows a traditional marketing and SDR relationship, which
lives outside of sales’ purview. In an ideal world, marketing, SDRs, and sales are
working alongside one another simultaneously. The after shows how coupling
marketing automation, and aligning these three roles, helps accelerate pre-sales
pipeline and meeting creation.

“The marketing, SDR, and sales relationship is a unique one. Time and time
again I’ve seen that the success of that relationship hinges on a relentless
commitment to communication and collaboration. One where marketing
and SDRs are focused on pre-sales, SDRs and sales work together on booking
meetings, and all three work in unison to accelerate deals to create a seamless
and remarkable buyer experience.”

NATASHA DOLGINSKY
Director of Growth, Clari

SDRs are essential in providing coverage for certain channels – from outreach on
direct mail campaigns to live chat on high-intent web pages.

Chelsea Ward

Hey Whitewhale!
Are you ready to start getting more out of your
existing customers? If so, book time below

Book a Meeting Now

22
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“Our role in marketing is about enabling the sales team to have better
conversations with the right customers. It’s about giving them the offers and
the turning point events that build a stronger business case.”

KATE ADAMS
VP of Demand Generation, Drift

Once an SDR has booked a meeting, it’s time to qualify buyers for sales. Many SDR
teams use the BANT methodology to do this. BANT is a qualification framework
that asks probing questions to identify right-fit buyers.

B
Budget
A
Authority
N
Need
T
Timing

Do they have the Do we know who the Does the prospect Do we know a
ability to spend? decision maker is? have an urgent timeframe in
business problem which they will
and paid to address? need a solution?

Establishing processes like this is important in nailing SDR to account executive

hand-off. Identify a similar framework that is easy to execute so deals can move
faster through your funnel.

23
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EXECUTE

HOW HIGH-
PERFORMANCE
SALES TEAMS
ACCELERATE
PIPELINE TO CLOSE
The best sales team is a data-driven sales team. Why? Because to
build predictable revenue you need a sales team that is confidently
tracking and acting on performance metrics. In this chapter, you’ll
learn how sales can take a more systematic approach to forecasting,
performance tracking, outreach, enablement, and more.

Defining Sales Metrics & KPIs

Looking once again at the revenue process playbook from chapter one, in addition
to forecasting revenue results, two actions happen at the execute phase:
• Targeting potential buyers

• Accelerating deal cycles

To measure success at this phase, your metrics should show how effective sales
are at these two steps.

“My biggest job as a CRO is meeting the high growth expectations of our board and
marketplace. To do this, we must understand our entire funnel and make sure
we are building the right pipeline to consistently meet or exceed targets. It also
requires that we hire, scale, and enable sales teams to be highly productive.”

TODD BARNETT
Chief Revenue Officer, Drift

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 +

There are a number of standard metrics sales is accountable for both at the team
and individual rep level. Here are a few key sales metrics most commonly tracked
on sales teams (we tried to keep these somewhat industry-agnostic):

Monthly recurring revenue (MRR)/Annual recurring revenue (ARR)

MRR/ARR is the contracted monthly or yearly revenue of your company.

Quota attainment
This metric is the number of closed deals (or revenue) in a given time period
against the chosen quota for that time period.

Win rate
This is the percentage of closed/won deals. Win rates are useful for tracking sales
performance over time and for forecasting how much pipeline coverage your sales
team needs to hit targets.

Sales forecasting accuracy

Arguably the most important number in a business, the sales forecast determines
how a company invests and grows. This has a massive impact on company
valuation. The more accurate your sales forecast is, the better you can plan, invest,
and grow your business.

Conversion rate
How good is your sales team at turning opportunities into new business? That's
what this metric helps answer.

Pipeline coverage
Tracking pipeline coverage helps keep sales performance on track. Getting an
accurate picture of pipeline coverage will help sales management identify red flags.

Sales cycle length

To accurately forecast, it’s important to track how long it takes sales to close
business. We suggest going even more granular to identify how long a deal takes at
each stage.

25
 +

Average deal size

This indicates the total revenue per closed deal. If you’re looking to grow sales and
move further upmarket, tracking deal size is necessary.

Sales activity (productivity)

Sales activity is a good indicator of deal velocity. It tells you whether or not an
account is actually engaged and the level of engagement in an opportunity. In
today's uncertainty, it's one of the only true ways to measure the health of a
relationship with an account or whether a deal is likely to close.

Sale linearity
Sales linearity is when revenue teams close opportunities in a predictable pattern
throughout the course of a quarter. Linearity gives sales a better chance of hitting
their numbers by avoiding the last minute rush at the end of the quarter to sign
contracts, get approvals, and maneuver through logistical roadblocks.

Deal slippage
Slippage rate is the percentage of opportunities that were in commitment at some
point, but then failed to close within their forecasted period. When you track
slipped deals you can easily identify them and create action plans to close next
quarter. Understanding your slippage rate provides some level of predictability to
your sales forecast.

Next quarter pipeline

Some of the most advanced companies we’ve seen spend at least half of their
quarter looking at out-quarter metrics to better predict where they will land –
and how to prepare for it.

Keeping a disciplined eye over sales metrics is important to sustainable revenue

growth, forecasting, and consistent sales performance.

26
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“Both teams need a more nuanced understanding than ever before of pipeline
coverage requirements for the different GTM motions that are in play. Gone are
the days of using a 3x or 4x coverage target. The revenue process is much more
dynamic than that.”

ANTHONY CESSARIO
VP of Enterprise Revenue, Clari

Another important piece of targeting buyers effectively and accelerating deal

cycles? Streamlined enablement and coaching programs.

Learn more about these sales metrics and others here:

15 Sales Metrics Every Revenue Leader Should Track

Embracing Sales Enablement & Coaching

What’s the secret behind high-performing sales teams? Two things: an incredible
enablement program and continuous sales coaching.
In this section you’ll learn how to master both.

How to Run a Best-in-Class Sales Enablement Program

Revenue enablement is a new field that – like revenue operations and
acceleration – looks to align and action revenue teams. This emerging profession
has been spearheaded by organizations like SiriusDecisions, who define revenue
enablement as “...a discipline that seeks to bring the skills, knowledge, assets, and
process expertise to all customer-facing roles – thus helping them to maximize
every buyer or customer interaction.”
As the definition implies, sales enablement lives under the umbrella of
revenue enablement.
According to Highspot’s State of Sales Enablement Report, sales enablement
adoption has increased by 343% in the last five years alone. For companies looking
to streamline their GTM strategy and action revenue teams, sales enablement is
essential. It brings together the content, information, expertise, and tools sales
needs to sell more effectively.

27
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“Sales needs to be trained on how to help customers understand their pain, uncover
that pain, and tie that pain back to a company's solution. They also need to learn
how to create urgency. The more urgency you can create in the sales process, the
better. Enablement is the knowledge base driving those valuable conversations in a
consistent and repeatable way.”

MARK KILENS
VP of Content & Community, Drift

So what does good sales enablement look like?

Depending on the structure of your sales team, enablement covers a spectrum of
roles. In this table, we see how enablement is embedded in the employee lifecycle,
the desired outcomes of an enabled and empowered sales team, and the targets/
metrics that define their success.
SERVING

Account Executives Account Managers Sales Managers

1. Equip: Equip sales reps with the resources, tools, and 1. NPS
education they need to succeed.
TARGETS

2. Quota Attainment PPR

PLAYS

2. Develop: Develop sales reps so they sell effectively with

a matured approach. 3. $X M ARR from
Deal Support
3. Close: Provide deal support to help sales reps close deals.
RESPONSIBILITES

Onboarding Sales Process Sales CRM Sales Tools

& Methodology Playbooks & Technology

Sales Content Ongoing Training Competitive QMP Deal Support

& Development Intelligence

28
 +

But sales enablement doesn’t just fall on the shoulders of a revenue enablement team.
Cross-collaboration is key. Here we see a sales enablement reinforcement cycle.
It spells out the teams involved in executing a best-in-class enablement program,
as well as the responsibilities within these teams.

REINFORCEMENT CYCLE
PRODUCT MARKETING
• Strategy
• Messaging
• Content Creation

REPS ENABLEMENT
• Feedback • Curriculum
• Participation • Assessments
• Peer-to-Peer Learning • Lead Trainings
• Leadership Opportunity • Operationalize

MANAGERS
• Curriculum Input
• Accountability
• Lead by Example
• Coaching

Investing in sales enablement ensures reps are ramped up for GTM, aligned on
process, and empowered to make buyers successful.

How to Improve Sales Effectiveness Through Coaching

& Deal Inspection
If you want a world-class sales team, you must invest time and resources in
coaching. In fact, the Sales Executive Council found that effective sales coaching
improves long-term sales rep performance by more than 19%.
One of the best ways to ensure effective coaching is through one-on-one
meetings with managers and sales reps.
The purpose of a one-on-one meeting is not to interrogate reps. These
meetings are meant to be collaborative, strategic, motivating, data-driven, and
tactical. Managers work with reps on deal execution, discuss current roadblocks
and how to resolve them, and strategize next best steps.

29
 +

To make the most of this time and leave reps feeling motivated (not interrogated),
managers should use a four-point deal inspection approach to assess the health
on ongoing deals.
This approach limits deal inspection to a series of four questions:
• What’s changed in the deal?

• How likely is the deal to close?

• How much activity do we have on this deal?

• Is this deal following our sales process?

“If you know these four data points on every deal your team is working, you can
avoid the tire kickers and focus on the right deals.”

BEN CHEN
Sales Engineering Manager, Clari

However, we all know that time is money — and when reps have dozens of deals in
play, the time it takes to review each of them can be costly. The key to an effective
deal inspection is having a single source of truth with real-time data allowing
you to identify and prioritize the opportunities that need the most attention. This
gives managers and reps time for other important aspects of sales coaching.

Learn more best practices on one-on-one sales meeting here:

The Sales Leader’s Guide to Mastering One-on-One
Sales Meetings

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 +

In an increasingly virtual
marketplace, sales leans
heavily on digital channels
and platforms to target
the right buyers at the
right time and with the
right message. While
digital transformation has
made it easier for sales
to connect with buyers, it
has also introduced a new
challenge: how to get sales
to focus on what matters.

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 +

Leveling Up Targeting & Outreaching

In an increasingly virtual marketplace, sales leans heavily on digital channels and
platforms to target the right buyers at the right time and with the right message.
While digital transformation has made it easier for sales to connect with buyers, it
has also introduced a new challenge: how to get sales to focus on what matters.

Enrolled in the BDR

outbound sequence

Lorraine 2:16pm
Hey Ashley, would love to connect.

Welcome back, Ashley! Want to

SELLER hear something cool? BUYER

Lorraine

Glad you’re checking out my

Drift video!

You can reply here to send me

a message while watching.

While ABM is a good way to target VIP accounts, creating target account lists
is often done manually and after-the-fact – without consideration for new and
emerging segments showing interest now.

“To create a great company, the CRO and CMO need to be aligned on their go-
to-market – from messaging to pricing to the personas we sell to – to how we
segment and package the product. Great companies and great revenue teams
are aligned and actioned in every aspect of a go-to-market strategy.”

BY TODD BARNETT
Chief Revenue Officer, Drift

In the revenue era, focus on both connecting with buyers in real-time AND
actioning sales (and other revenue teams) in real-time to drive value.
Once you’ve ramped up sales, it’s time to look at driving engagement in
these accounts.

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Source: Drift, Engagement Score in Drift Prospector

“When growing a sales organization, there are two key themes you should
focus on: capacity and engagement. It’s critical that reps, their leaders, and all
supporting GTM teams are quickly focusing their collective resources on the
business segments where they can make the most impact.”

ANTHONY CESSARIO
VP of Enterprise Revenue, Clari

Conversational Sales is the other side of the Revenue Acceleration coin. Like
Conversational Marketing, Conversational Sales is about creating more
conversations with buyers to grow revenue. This means cutting out the middle
man – whether it be forms or long follow-up times – to start meaningful
conversations in real-time.
But what does a “meaningful” conversation look like? In a word, “empathetic.”
At Drift, we like to say “helping is the new selling.” And this continues to be true
not just in more personable marketing content, but in sales outreach as well.

Learn more about using empathy in your sales outreach here:

5 Email Templates to Make Your Sales Outreach More Empathetic

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 +

Conversational Sales takes an empathetic and buyer-centric approach to

engagement. Here’s what that looks like:
• Understand what buyers want. Outside of the information marketing and SDRs
have gathered, what else do you need to know? Ask buyers to clarify and elaborate.

• Be present and use active listening. Don’t steam-roll a conversation with

your own narrative. Let your buyers speak first. Respond in kind with answers
that show you’re listening.

• Be passionate. If you’re not fired up, your buyers won’t be either. Positivity
and enthusiasm are contagious. Use them.

• Answer all of your buyer’s questions. Don’t lead with vague responses that
may stall a deal further down the line. “I don’t know, but let me find out for
you,” is a perfectly reasonable response. Just make sure you find the answer
and follow up quickly.

• Be transparent. Share what you’re doing on your end to help the buyer and
what next steps will look like.

• Share examples. People want to see real-world results. Have customer

stories on tap, and if possible, examples from a given buyer’s industry or
pain point perspective.

• Help the buyer buy and sell internally. Help them navigate the buying
process and champion your product/service.

Another important job for sales? Ensuring a seamless transition between them
and customer success. The customer doesn’t want to feel like they are starting
from scratch. They want a seamless transition. Sales and CS must find a way to
transfer knowledge without being a big burden on the outgoing rep who is likely
eager to move on to the next deal.

Learn more about Conversational Sales here:

Conversational Sales Handbook

34
 +

Given B2B accounts have

multiple decision-makers,
developing a process to
measure sentiment with
each contact is critical.
That way you can see
potential churn ahead of
time instead of relying on
anecdotal feedback that’s
too little too late.

35
 +

EXPAND

HOW BEST-IN-
CLASS CUSTOMER
SUCCESS RETAINS &
GROWS ACCOUNTS
Business leaders are now calling customer experience the “third growth
funnel.” Today, customer experience (CX) and customer success (CS)
have emerged as key functions for driving retention revenue and
creating customer relationships that last.

Defining Customer Success Metrics & KPIs

Both CS and CX were created in response to B2B businesses taking a more active
role in growing customer relationships, retention, and experiences.
While there are a number of metrics your CS and CX teams can measure and act
on, here are the ones we consider critical:

Customer churn %
There are three types of churn to measure in a business. Customer churn is
the percent of customers who leave you at the end of a time period against the
customers you had in the previous time period. This could be tracked monthly,
quarterly, and yearly.

Revenue churn %
This is the revenue lost from churned customers (and down-selling) at the end of
a time period against the revenue from a previous time period.

Net dollar churn %

This is the revenue lost from churn and down-selling, plus gains from expansion
revenue. This indicates how expansion revenue offsets revenue churn.

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 +

Expansion revenue %
This is all of your new revenue from upsells and cross-sells for a given time period
divided by the revenue at the end of the previous time period.

Gross revenue retention

This is the annual revenue loss from churned customers. This metric does not take
into account upgrades, cross-sales, up-sales, etc. This number shows the health
of your company’s growth rate.

Net revenue retention

Net retention is the total revenue (including new business, upgrades, cross-
sales, and up-sales) minus any revenue churn (including churned customers and
downgraded customers). This is tracked over a fixed period. Sales and CS both
track this, but typically this metric is owned by CS.

# of Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs)

QBRs are quarterly meetings between a customer’s decision-makers/primary
contacts and your business. Their purpose is to realign on your customer’s
strategic targets and discuss how your business will support them. QBRs are also a
good touchpoint for requesting referrals or reviews.

Net Promoter Score (NPS)

There are a number of sentiment-based metrics out there. NPS is the most popular
for understanding overall loyalty (vs. satisfaction at a specific transactional
moment). NPS surveys ask: “On a scale from 0 to 10, with 10 being extremely
likely, how likely are you to recommend <COMPANY> to a friend or colleague?”
These surveys are best sent on a quarterly basis or before a QBR.

Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT)

CSAT is great for measuring satisfaction at specific touchpoints (for example, how
satisfied a customer was after a support call). In a CSAT survey customers are asked:
How would you rate your overall satisfaction with the [goods/service] you received?”
This is measured on a 1 to 5 point scale, with 5 being “extremely satisfied.”

Having a clear understanding of CS’s impact on a company’s bottom line is critical.

But understanding the why behind the retention and churn numbers you’re seeing
is just as important.

37
 +

“The three key metrics we track that directly affect revenue are gross retention,
net retention, and churn. But these metrics are just the starting point. For
example, for churn we will try to understand the reason for churn and then
break it down between addressable and non-addressable factors. From there,
we can build playbooks to mitigate future risk and inform our company and
product strategies.”

AMY JOHNSON
VP of Customer Success, Clari

Both CX and CS need to keep a pulse on customer relationships as they mature

over time, in addition to retention metrics. Below we’ve included an illustration
of a post-sale customer journey. At the top level is your feedback engine, this
includes metrics like NPS and CSAT, as well as other feedback avenues like QBRs,
other surveys, reviews, and referrals.

Closed won Onboarding

survey survey NPS CSAT QBR NPS QBR Review Referral

FEEDBACK
ENGINE

KICK-OFF &
ONBOARDING ADOPTION GROWTH ADVOCACY
HAND-OFF

KEY • Deal signed & • Intro key • Drive usage and • Renewal • Partner on
MILESTONES payment decision-makers adoption • Upgrades customer story
• Intro of and users • Share • Cross-sell • Leave a review
customer to • User training knowledge base • Up-sell • Promote on
point of contact • Integrations • Introduce best social
and CSM practices and • Partner on
benchmarks events

TEAMS • Sales • CSM • CSM • AM • Sales

INVOLVED • CSM • Onboarding • Professional • Professional • AM
• Integration Services Services • CSM
• Customer • Customer • Customer • Marketing
Support Support Support
• Product • Product
• Marketing • Marketing

Given B2B accounts have multiple decision-makers, developing a process to measure

sentiment with each contact is critical. That way you can see potential churn ahead of
time instead of relying on anecdotal feedback that’s too little too late.

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 +

Embracing CSM Enablement & Coaching

CSM enablement, like sales enablement, is all about arming your CS and customer-
facing teams with the processes and information to make customers successful.
CSM enablement teams are focused on creating internal certification programs
and developing content and knowledge around:
• CSM’s GTM processes

• Products/services

• Creating more value for customers

• Persona research

• Conducting QBRs

• Driving expansion revenue

Similar to sales enablement, CSM enablement is not run in isolation, and relies on
team managers, product marketing, and others to run the enablement engine.

“CS enablement is about equipping CS with the right training and content to
use with customers. CS enablement is also about customer enablement, and
giving customers the tools to self-service their own learning. This includes
training, certifications, knowledge bases, education within your product,
and more. At the end of the day, the more you can do to make your customer
successful faster, the better chance you're going to have at increasing
customer lifetime value.”

MARK KILENS
VP of Content & Community, Drift

When it comes to accelerating revenue, investing in CSM enablement is just as

important as investing in sales enablement. CS is not only tasked with putting
the best face forward for your brand, but driving additional expansion revenue to
increase CLV. As such, any enablement program that doesn’t give equal investment
to CSM and sales is incomplete.

39
 +

Growing Customer Value & Retention

To grow customer value and retention, you need to change CS from a reactionary
team to a proactive, prescriptive, and predictable team.

“The role of customer success is critical for customer growth. When customers
purchase, customer success keeps the momentum and excitement they have
for your solution, and focuses on driving them to successfully set up and
start seeing value as soon as possible. By enabling this value early, you set the
relationship up for success and fast-track opportunities for platform adoption
and expansion-based growth.”

JULIE HOGAN
VP of Customer Experience, Drift

In the next few sections we’ll discuss what that looks like.

Proactive
A proactive approach to CS implies that your reps are actively connecting and
reinforcing your business value to customers. CS should be running a multitude of
plays to increase retention, adoption, advocacy, and expansion. These plays include:
• Rehab plays: Plays here focus on turning unhealthy customer accounts into
healthy ones.

• Re-onboarding plays: In this play, there may be a new point of contact (POC) that
needs onboarding, or a customer that needs a bit more training and enablement.

• Resell plays: This play often involves losing an initial POC and champion. This
requires CS and sales to sell to an account (again) internally to reestablish a
business case.

• Expand plays: Expansion plays focus on driving up-sell, cross-sell, upgrades,

and more.

• Ghosting plays: Ghosting is a major headache in CS. In this play, CSMs work to
reestablish contact with an account that has gone silent.

CS should work with marketing to create campaigns specifically for customers

around these different plays.

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 +

“It’s important to understand the different superpowers of your sales and

customer success team – and ensure your roles, responsibilities, and processes
allow for those to shine. For example, if sales is focusing on the commercial
aspects of a relationship, then CS can focus on driving value and adoption.”

AMY JOHNSON
VP of Customer Success, Clari

Engagement here is key. CS should start conversations with customers on their

terms and make it easy for customers to reach out in real-time or answer their
own questions through self-service.
Additionally, you should understand where your CSMs are spending their time
and identify if certain accounts are being neglected so you can take action. Do
this by looking at activity metrics and account engagement.

Chatbot

Hey there, Whitewhale

It seems like you’re interested in our

pricing. Do you have any questions on
cloud software? I’m happy to help.

yes

can I speak to a person?

Chelsea Ward

Hello! Chelsea from sales here.

How can I help?

Prescriptive
Whether done in unison with professional services or not, your CSMs should be
well-trained consultants and experts on your products and services, industry, and
customers’ industries.
By understanding your customer’s business AND your product, CSMs can
be prescriptive and identify the best steps to create more value for customers.
This is where CSM enablement becomes so important. Through training and
certifications, companies create in-house expertise and a more consistent
customer experience across the board.

41
 +

Predictive
What does potential churn look like? What customer accounts have opportunities
for expansion? How can CS leaders forecast churn and retention more effectively?
Just as marketing and sales forecast for future pipeline, so too should CS. Earlier
we mentioned the importance of looking at three different types of churn: customer
churn, revenue churn, and net dollar churn. These metrics are key to forecasting
accurately based on historical trends.

Source: Clari, Customer Success Forecast Example

Technology like machine learning can help more accurately forecast future churn.
However, if machine learning isn’t in the cards right now, CSM and renewal
managers can work in unison to identify red flags well ahead of time – as well as
expansion opportunities.
Here are a few best practices to improve forecasting, mitigate future churn, and
follow-up on growth opportunities:
• Notate churn reasons. Require CSMs to record churn reasons when an
account has churned. Ideally, you would use a picklist in your CRM to better
aggregate this historical data further down the line.

• Define healthy customer benchmarks. Have defined metrics around what

a healthy customer account looks like. What activities have healthy accounts
executed in the past? Scale those metrics across your business segments
(small to medium-businesses to enterprise accounts). Use these health
metrics as benchmarks to measure against.

42
 +

• Segment customers. Use benchmarking information to segment your

customers into opportunities for potential growth, healthy accounts, and at-
risk accounts.

• Have CSM and renewal managers work in lockstep. Keep an open line
of communication between renewal managers and CS as a renewal date
approaches. Add an automated reminder when this renewal is coming 90
days before so you can go through the customer health benchmarks. Manage
renewal and expansion opportunities with the same rigor as your net new
deals. Create visibility into the status of the deal and proactively spot risk.

• Send a survey prior to renewal. Send an NPS survey to an account before a

renewal to pulse check sentiment. Raise any key issues prior to the renewal date.

• Create next steps for churn and expansion. Identify triage tactics for high-
risk accounts. And operationalize next steps for growth opportunities.

Investing in technology to streamline and automate these tasks make it easier to

identify churn and opportunities. However, these steps will let you work within
your means to position CS for success.
CS should also be practicing extreme empathy with their customers – especially
during times of uncertainty. Not only does this help build lasting relationships, but
more predictive outcomes and opportunities.

“Leading with empathy has been a core part of how we handle challenges that
come our way. Our customer success team is focused on using the constraints
of our ‘new normal’ to get more creative in providing value to our customers.
This has opened up additional opportunities to engage with customers.”

AMY JOHNSON
VP of Customer Success, Clari

43
 +

There’s a better way to

revenue. That new way
requires a new thinking
– an understanding that
revenue is so much more
than a mere outcome. It’s
an end-to-end business
process that can be
optimized, streamlined,
and automated.

44
 +

FINAL THOUGHTS

REVENUE IS
A PROCESS
BY ANDY BYRNE
CEO, Clari

Whether we’re talking about revenue operations or Revenue Acceleration, one thing is
clear: Revenue generation is the most important activity in any B2B company.
There’s just one problem: Few teams view revenue as an end-to-end
business process that can be streamlined and optimized for efficiency. For most
companies, this process remains disconnected, inefficient, and unpredictable,
managed with a DIY hodgepodge of spreadsheets, stale reports, inconsistent
manual processes, and communications that aren’t tracked anywhere.
As we’ve seen in this book, there’s a better way to revenue. That new way
requires a new thinking – an understanding that revenue is so much more than
a mere outcome. It’s an end-to-end business process that can be optimized,
streamlined, and automated.
And it’s more important than ever before. The CEOs, CROs, and board members
we talk to – at both publicly-traded or privately-held companies – are all
looking for answers to the same questions:
• How can they get more confidence in their revenue generation process?

• How can they better predict how their revenue teams will perform?

• What can they do to ensure accurate sales forecasts in order to drive more
predictable revenue?

When revenue leaders can accurately predict where they will land at the end of this
quarter, the next quarter, and the quarter after that, they can effectively invest and
grow the business.
While every conversation differs, the conclusions we reach are remarkably
similar. They all center around the idea of having the right alignment, the right
instrumentation, and the right rigor across your end-to-end revenue operations
and acceleration process.

45
 +

As more businesses strive for that renewed revenue confidence in this uncertain
market, alignment across the entire revenue generation team will be essential.
We hope this resource proves invaluable in planning your GTM motions now
and in the future. Let’s briefly recap what we walked through:
• With revenue operations, businesses can double down on internal revenue
processes that work alongside new tech.

• Once a clear process is in place, Revenue Acceleration enables revenue teams

to connect with buyers and customers in real-time across channels.

As more businesses look to streamline their customer experience, getting internal

alignment and execution locked down will be essential. If you’re looking for more
insight on how to use revenue operations and Revenue Acceleration as part of your
GTM strategy, reach out to the Drift and Clari teams today 👇
About Drift
Drift is the Revenue Acceleration Platform that uses Conversational Marketing
and Conversational Sales to help companies grow revenue and increase customer
lifetime value, faster. More than 50,000 businesses use Drift to align sales and
marketing on a single platform to deliver a unified customer experience where
people are free to have a conversation with a business at any time, on their terms.

To learn more, visit drift.com.

About Clari
Clari’s Revenue Operations Platform helps B2B organizations increase win rates,
shorten sales cycles, and improve forecast accuracy by using AI and automation
to create full-funnel accountability across go-to-market teams. Clari is used
by hundreds of sales, marketing, and customer success teams at leading B2B
companies including Adobe, Zoom, Dropbox, and Okta to drive pipeline, audit
deals and accounts, forecast the business, and reduce churn.

To learn more, visit clari.com.

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